The number of tickets being issued for services (such as airline and other forms of travel as well as hotel accommodations, concerts, seminars, shows, park admissions, events and the like) is rapidly increasing. It is especially true that the number of electronic tickets, and specifically electronic tickets for airline travel, is increasing very rapidly. Many travelers, and especially frequent business travelers, find themselves in the position of scheduling many trips, changing itineraries, canceling or rescheduling trips, and otherwise creating a complex history of travel scheduling and rescheduling. It is not unusual in the midst of this hectic travel history to forget, or lose track, unused tickets. The problem of forgetting to timely use such tickets and/or forgetting to redeem unused tickets is exacerbated by the growing use of electronic tickets, since, with the electronic ticket, the traveler may have no paper record to remind him or her when to use a ticket or even that a ticket ever existed.
Unfortunately, unused and forgotten tickets expire after some prescribed period of time. If forgotten and unclaimed after expiration, the money paid for the ticket is usually kept by the airline or other service provider, and no benefit is ever realized by the purchaser. If a number of unused but paid for tickets expire and are not refunded or redeemed, a frequent traveler or a business that employs one or more travelers can sustain a significant financial loss and/or fail to capitalize on valuable opportunity.
If the tickets are refundable, some of this loss may be recovered by tracking unused tickets and seeking refunds. But such refunds typically must be sought in a timely manner. For example, full or partial refunds may be available prior to a specific date, but may be severely limited after such date. Even if the tickets are not refundable, they may nevertheless be redeemable for some form of value. In such cases, the loss may be mitigated through redemption of the unused tickets. The importance of this latter situation is becoming increasingly important because, while the use of electronic tickets is growing, so is the use of non-refundable tickets. This trend is due in large part to the significant cost savings associated with non-refundable tickets, which is causing their increased use by business travelers. Unfortunately, to recapture value from an unused, non-refundable ticket usually requires a cumbersome alternative to a refund such as an exchange, a credit, a discount, or some other mechanism for redeeming the ticket to capture its residual value. In addition, the window during which value may be captured from an unused ticket typically does not remain open indefinitely, and the value that may be recaptured tends to decrease with the passage of time. Accordingly, although it is typically preferable to use a ticket as scheduled, the next best option is typically to redeem an unused ticket as soon as possible, preferably before the scheduled date of the ticket.
In the past there has been no efficient way to track pending and/or unused tickets and to facilitate their use and/or their redemption for value on behalf of the traveler or the traveler's employer. Any systems that have been available have been substantially manual systems that are unreliable and have little ability to track current or past activity or to report on tickets that need to be used, that were actually redeemed, or that were not redeemed. Accordingly, a need existed for an automated system for identifying soon to expire tickets and unused tickets that have not been redeemed for value, for determining what form of redemption may be used, and for communicating, to the appropriate party such as the ticket holder, appropriate information to facilitate use of the tickets or the issuance of redemption credit or exchange.
Furthermore, if a traveler purchases an electronic or paper ticket from an issuing agency (e.g., travel agent), according to ARC restrictions, any refund related to the ticket must be issued by the same issuing agency. For example, when a traveler purchases a ticket using a financial transaction account (e.g., charge card), wherein the charge card used to purchase the ticket is issued by the same entity that issues the ticket, it is often easier for the charge card issuer to obtain a refund for the client. However, when a traveler purchases a ticket from an issuing agency, but the traveler uses an unrelated financial transaction account (e.g., charge card), the traveler is not able to obtain a refund directly from the host of the transaction account. Accordingly, a need exists for a system which automatically notifies a third party issuing agency of unused tickets purchased with an unrelated charge card.